Swallowtail (A Sailor's End)
by x. I Got You First .x
Summary: A pager, an unexpected arrival, and a wayward transmission, and suddenly – for the first time in three years – there's hope. [Inspired by the end credit scene of Captain Marvel. Endgame Rewrite; because I'm very unhappy (still).]
1. Chapter 1

**Spoilers for the post-credit scene of Captain Marvel**. _Turn back now while you still can. I won't be able to warn you again._

* * *

"It just turned off."

"We're not getting anything."

"See there? The battery is still connected. We _should_ be getting something, but we just aren't."

Not for the last time, Rhodes wished he had a certain technology genius by his side, but this time, his reason wasn't only personal. Surely, they would understand this transmission all the better, then, or at the very least, their small gang of survivors would be all the more inclined as to what was happening with an expert's input.

"Keep trying. We have to find out who this message was for," Steve persists, as if the rest of the team needs reminding.

"And if they're willing to help," Natasha mutters. The verbalisation of the addendum works to support their growing anxieties. What if the person – if it even _is_ a person – ended up turning up their nose and backs on the situation? If they were in agreement with Thanos…

"One thing at a time," the Captain course-corrects their straying thoughts. "Focus on getting this thing working, the rest of us–"

Natasha stopped dead in her tracks. Steve only saw in his periphery. He turned, as did the rest of them, and there stood someone he was pretty certain hadn't the clearance to be there at all. A woman. Blond hair, deadset glare, and a suit the same colour as the transmission. Same star, same blue above and red below. When she spoke, it was one of command and certainty, and it signified that she was not going to take any nonsense. When she spoke, she demanded;

"Where is Nicholas Fury?"

* * *

They sat around the coffee table. A box of store-bought cookies stood in the centre (which no one touched). Ever since the mad titan had his final say, casual appetite hasn't seen the light of day.

Just five years ago, a similar set of faces sat around this very coffee table. Even then, in the face of what then could have been the Avengers extinction, the conversation had been much livelier than now. Silence did not so much hang in the air as freeze into imperishable static. The same static that had accompanied their small gang of survivors since their defeat. They had grown together in the static, and still were drawing closer, to become something akin to a family. But the love developed could not fill in the holes of grief. Not yet. It would be a long time until then.

Of the same faces, there was him, Natasha, and Colonel Rhodes. Painstakingly few, now that Steve took a moment to reflect on it. He took comfort in their continued presence while welcoming the newer faces. Bruce, the most unexpected of the returns, stood behind the same couch on which Natasha sat, hands on the cushioned back. He leaned into it, no doubt his scientific mind analysing everything their new arrival said. Then, there was Pepper, perched on a separate armchair, legs crossed and gaze unwavering. She had grown straighter in posture, harder in jawline, and sharper in attitude. She rarely spoke of Tony anymore. Steve didn't think she even uttered his name in a full year.

"The transmission, it goes without saying that it was yours," Natasha began. Everyone in the room eyed the newcomer warily, but only Romanoff possessed the will and the words to finally confront the situation head on.

The woman – Carol, as they learned – nodded.

"How do you know Fury?"

"We met at a Blockbuster."

And a story unraveled from there.

* * *

A dead transmission.

_At least it worked_.

She heard nothing in the past three years regarding her would-be husband, but then – out of the blue – some stranger shows up demanding another lost loved one. As if Pepper needed more problems. The glimmering gemstone around her left ring finger seemed to pull her hand down at the thought. _Would-be_, her mind harped upon. Not even a reality anymore, just a could-have-been, should-have-been, would-have-been. While she didn't need him to survive considering the technicalities of the universe, she needed him to _live_. Whether Pepper had expected it or not ten years ago, her heart and soul were forever entwined with Tony's forever.

She tried to move on. Everyone else had. She had stopped uttering his name in a year, hoping maybe the physical choice would become a mental habit and she no longer had to feel the heaviness in her heart. She tried to act like everyone she saw around her, but Pepper felt the resolve slowly crumbling away inside her.

"I need him alive," she whispered in the direction of the pager. _Old tech,_ she mused bittersweetly, _Tony has made so much better._

Rhodey dipped his head in understanding. He had remained so silent this whole time, Pepper had forgotten of his presence.

As much as Pepper wanted to hear words of consolation, his lack of empty promises was commendable, and in the long run, the mere comfort of his being there would be the most comforting.

"We both do."

He placed a hand on her shoulder, and she bit her lip. It had to stop trembling. She had to look strong. Pepper had never cried in front of anyone since she was much, much younger and injured herself attempting to master the bicycle. Even when Tony had gone missing the first time, her tears had not fallen in public. She had a handle on herself back then, but she was losing the battle. Every morning when she awoke alone in their king-sized bed had killed her a little inside. She had to move to the guest room where there was a single, twin bed and she could stare at the ceiling, pretending for a few minutes each morning that she was simply on another business trip and would be in her lover's arms by the end of the week. Seeing her fantasies fall every time she walked into the compound's kitchen, doing a head count and seeing no Anthony Stark, tore apart her heart all over again.

But she wasn't made of glass. She was made of just as much iron as Tony. Natasha and Rhodey were the only ones who looked at her as such. The others – the ones she had hardly known before she joined their sad survivor squad – regarded her as if she would break any second. The frustration welled up inside her. It was only through her experience in overcoming such urges that straightened her spine.

She was Pepper Potts, renowned CEO and definitely not a crier.

There was no ruining her reputation now.

* * *

"What is it?" Her eyes widened at Bruce's frantic nature. Pepper pulled out of Rhodey's embrace and followed the scientist to the communal sitting room. "What's happening, why are we all here?" she asked again when no one answered the first time.

"We received something," Steve obliged albeit vaguely.

"–On Stark's secure server," Natasha finished, supplying the necessary information to complete in picture in Pepper's head.

"He's alive?"

Hope flooded the chosen three syllables.

"According to the transmission." Steve's hand hovered by the button, ready to play. Everyone looked at Pepper, who was too dumbstruck to move, speak, or otherwise think. _Tony_ rang throughout her mind like an alarm bell. _Tony, Tony, Tony_. Years of preparing herself to believe the worst, only for his voice to once more be heard by her very ears. A new set of words, not recordings from FRIDAY. A new way of inflection, while pertaining to his usual speech patterns, that she didn't need her mind to concoct late at night. This was _Tony_, the _real_ Tony, the _current_ Tony, and the _only_ Tony she wanted by her side.

"Where is he? Do you know?" She glanced between everyone's expecting faces wearily. How she hated the wispiness of her voice. She could be so resolute and final, but this… it melted any remaining conviction possessed into her shoes.

Bruce pounced on the question before anyone else. "Well, um, something encrypted came with the message – we think it's some sort of coordinates, probably jumbled from the distance; it's a long way from home."

Hope and despair battled for her heart.

"I– Can I–?" Pepper ran through directions in her mind – _down the hall, take a right, follow the progression of doorways, stop_ – of how she could escape. They expected her to be okay with this! If she accepted, she'd have to hear his voice with no means of getting home. "Is there any way of knowing the coordinates?" _Without hearing the message?_ flew under the radar. Faces exchanged glances, as if they knew something she did not. Having usually been clued in to the inside workings, Pepper found herself disliking the feeling of not knowing.

"We don't know what's said. We decided to wait," for her, Pepper, to be in the room, too.

Everything crescendoed in the direction of a frantic explosion. She wanted to hear it, she didn't want to hear it. She wanted to hear it, she didn't. She wanted to hear it, but with everyone else gone. But she needed the support. But she needed the privacy. The support or the privacy. Circling, circling, no conclusion, conflicting necessities. Over and over, and then she stopped. Mind's cycling, halted. Heart's fluttering, quelled. She forced the torment inside her down despite her stomach flipping in protest. She drew in the air around her, forcing her to act like the iron she was made of, and dipped her head. "Play it," spoke the CEO in a clear, decisive indication. All faces around her turned sympathetic, but Pepper did not cave. Her decision was final and serious: in the end, both she and the Avengers needed to know. End of story. She couldn't be selfish, as much as she wanted Tony's voice all to herself, as much as she wanted not to feel the despair of knowing she possessed no power to save him, as much as she wished she could somehow change the sound she knew his voice would take – helpless and defeated, like all of them but multiplied twelve times over.

Steve pressed play.

_This thing on?_

And Pepper melted.

_Hey, Ms. Potts._

Two words she once grew so accustomed to now drove a stake through her heart. 'Miss' and 'Potts'.

_If you find this recording, don't feel bad about this. Part of the journey is the end._

"No," she whispered, audible for only her lips and her ears, but Rhodey saw. His eyes fell upon her, observing her, with a steady stream of concern. _This isn't the end, not your end_, she would have spoken back had it been just her. She felt a hand on her shoulder, but her eyes never wavered.

_Just for the record, being adrift in space with zero promise of rescue is more fun than it sounds._

_Food and water ran out four days ago. Oxygen will run out tomorrow morning._

_That'd be it._

Pepper closed her eyes.

_I know I said no more surprises, but I was hoping I could pull off one more._

When the thought drifted off, Pepper assumed the worst. The recording was unfinished, because he never finished it. He was gone, exactly then, and Pepper could only hold him forevermore in her dreams, his fate untouched by hers.

_When I drift off, I will dream about you._

_It's always you._

Her vision came around to softened faces, and she wished she were alone. Even Rhodey's hand massaging her back felt unwelcome, all of a sudden. If it were just she and the recording, she'd let the mass of everything building inside her out. The in-held reservoirs would become waterfalls, and that would be the end of stoic, competent Pepper Potts. The message hadn't been for the Avengers. That was the worst realisation. The message hadn't been a plea for saving. The message was a goodbye, a proper goodbye, like one he wasn't able to give his parents.

_Eyes_, Pepper warned herself. Everybody's pair – some blue, some brown, some hazel – fixated on her. Was she expected to say something? What could she say to that? _About_ that? _After_ that? Pepper stood as much shell-shocked as the rest. More so. More shell-shocked than she had ever been. When Tony had been sighted in Afghanistan, she hadn't been as shocked. When he had let slip he had been dying, she hadn't been as shocked. When he had continuously woken up from the nightmares regarding New York, she hadn't been as shocked. When he called her from Siberia, slowly freezing to death, cocooned in broken armour, she had been mortified but still not as much as now. _A confirmation of death; a final goodbye._

The burden of first words, however, lifted from her shoulders with someone else's bewildered, "Where's Carol?"

As soon as the words escaped into the air, the proximity alarm sounded across the entire compound.

* * *

_Part One of Two. Hope you enjoyed – don't forget to leave a review!_


	2. Chapter 2

_Part Two of two. Hope you enjoy; leave a review! :)_

* * *

Tony staggered to the ramp. A decade earlier, just out of the grip of captivity, Tony was being helped down a similar one. Save for an empty stomach and parched throat, no one guided him now. Fresh air attacked his lungs were the ferocity of wolves. The comforting indication of Summertime replaced frigid, canned oxygen. The difference was like fire and ice. If this were his last few breaths… perhaps his mind was toying with him, giving him illusions of Earth to ease his passing. His vision swam in and out of darkness. Hazy. Solid, solid, he searched for a solid edge. Anywhere. His feet shifted and lost his balance. He swayed, he blinked, and he forced himself to halt. If he allowed gravity to decide, he feared its claim would be final.

Tony must have heard the proximity alarm. Right? He must have. He wouldn't have designed the Compound without it. Yet, sounds swam in the air around him as if it were an ocean, some of the waves even lazy enough not to meet his ears. He stumbled again, catching his weight on the ceiling bar above him. If he had stumbled merely a foot ahead… oh, the imagined pain.

Hands were upon him. Warm, gentle hands. Arms encircled him then broke apart. Another hand steadied his shoulder. Faces. Faceless. He regarded one with wide eyes but for the life of him couldn't match a name to the familiar curves. Round… round and light hair, a sturdy build. The eyes, they were wrong. Why were the eyes wrong? Blue eyes? Peter didn't have blue eyes.

"Tony. Tony? Can you hear me?"

Peter. Peter was calling. No. Not Peter. Peter was gone.

Sound blurred with the light before him. An urge to speak rose through his chest. A 'Who are you?' would be a great place to start, but the first word hardly fell from his lips – a trembled "Who–?" – when dots danced in his eyes, tearing any meager concentration he still possessed away from the real world. His eyelids were so heavy. He scrunched his nose, squinted his eyes, and gritted his teeth to fight the onslaught of exhaustion approaching as rapidly as a tsunami. Taking him over, taking him under, dragging him where he did not wish to go. Spluttering, floundering, unable to tell which direction was up and which was down. He needed only a life-raft, but his saving grace was nowhere to be seen.

Beeping. All around him. Killer headache. Tony wished he could clamp his ears at the sound, but it persisted. It didn't seem hostile nor glaring nor alarming. _Beep beep_, pause, _beep beep_, pause. It aggravated him. His teeth slowly ground across each other.

The backs of his eyelids weren't black anymore. He detected muttering in the distance, but the exchange sounded too far away for him to discern specific syllables. He strained as best as his body would allow. Who were they? What did they want? He… he thought… he thought he recognised one. Tony snapped his eyes open again but suddenly wished he hadn't. The heavy and deep blue of before… Where did it go? White so brilliantly invaded his eyes. The pounding in his brain intensified. He groaned and rolled over, but something restrained his legs. A cover of some sort stretched only so far before growing taut.

The distant din faded into footsteps. Tony tensed. They were running towards him. Someone came crashing down around him, and his muscles tightened beyond belief. Engulfed, he was, in a wave of orange. Upon realising that she wasn't going to hurt him, he relaxed, but his hands found a way to her shoulders. The cry of his name mere seconds beforehand circled like a lost buzzard, unable to determine the best place to land. Brown eyes blinked blankly up at her.

"Tony," she breathed. Her hand went to his cheek. _Warmth_. It coursed through him like a fire, thawing the ice cage which had enclosed around his already guarded heart. "What's wrong? Are you okay? Do you remember–?"

His slow progression of a smile put a stop to her worry. A hand slid off her shoulder before coming to a rest on her forearm.

"Pepper," he breathed. He could pore into those crystal blue eyes for the length of eternity.

"You're back!" Pepper returned in an equally as quiet voice, as if any louder might break the purity of the moment. "You came back!"

"Always do."

In the way she shifted – the slightest dip in her shoulders, the twitch of her eyelashes, the quiver of her bottom lip – announced to Tony that the burden of those words did not go unfelt.

She knew. _She always knew_. At the very least, Tony did not have to explain. Words… The temperature around him dropped a dozen degrees at the thought of accounting everything since Squidward touched down upon the Earth.

"Tony!" A new voice. This voice was laced with the certain thrill of a friend. It bounced like pebbles on rocks. Tony turned his head to the right.

The lean, sometimes-mean, sometimes-green strength machine stood there with a wide grin on his face. Although the extent of what he could manage in his foggy state was small, Tony would have to be stone cold to avoid smiling back. To be among friends... After space, anything was welcome, but this was exceptionally pleasant. He had had so much time to ponder the fate of everyone back home – too much time – but the indeterminable answers worsened with worry the longer he stayed confined. Confirmation that his worst fears had not been realised quelled his beating heart.

"I think I need a cheeseburger," he said quietly, again facing Pepper. He caught her head dip and a silent chuckle traverse her lips. "Kind of a tradition, right?"

"You need a press conference, too?" she answered without so much as missing a beat.

The tenderness between them was all Tony needed in the moment. His heart might still be fragmented, and it may take years to piece together the fragments of his heart, but right now all he needed was a little bit of gentle.

* * *

_And scene. For now, that is all this story has to offer. If I strike inspiration within the next few days (before Endgame day! aka Saturday) or someone has a suggestion for future chapters, I may consider extending this onwards. However, I feel this is a satisfactory end. It certainly did satisfy my impatience for the second part to Infinity War. If you enjoyed, tell me about it in the review! I would love to hear your thoughts._


End file.
